Carp Fishing – A Lovely Linear – By TJ Elliot

Carp Fishing – A Lovely Linear – By TJ Elliot

I got down the lake to find out that there were no swims free on my local club lake, so after a little talk with a friend of mine, Oscar Thornton, he allowed me to double up with him in a swim called ‘the steps’. I was only on for a quick night, and due to never fishing this swim, I decided to fish how I would usually fish in any other swim. Having tied a couple of rigs the night before, all that was needed was to find a harder patch to fish, and for me to bait it. After having a little lead about, I managed to find two harder spots, which were ideal for both of my rods. Shortly after this, I continued on and put some bait in. Roughly 3 kilos of hemp, boilies and tigers were piled on to the spot (thanks again for the bait rusty).

With the spots now baited, I decided to tie 2 hinged stiff rigs (these being tied with a couple of size 5 Covert Chod hooks and a couple of short lengths of 25lb Trip Wire) onto 2 lengths of Heavy Plummet Leadcore (roughly about 5 foot) set up helicopter style. Both rods went out with a nice, hard ‘donk’, leaving me extremely confident for the night. The first bite came at about 3am, and I was more than happy to have a 20lb+ mirror in the net. After getting the same rod back out and getting my head down, I was awoken again at 6am to an absolute screamer on the same rod again, this fish being a cracking upper double common. After this, I was wide awake and there wasn’t a chance of me getting back to sleep. So I decided to put the rod back out there again. 10 o’clock arrived and the bacon for the sandwiches were on. By this time, all hope for another bite was gone due to lake only usually doing night time bites.

At about 12 o’clock a very strange take occurred on the left hand rod again, and I found myself bent into what I thought was a very angry catfish… Shortly after giving the ‘catfish’ the butt I soon learnt that what I thought was a catfish was now a rather large looking mirror that had just surfaced about 30 yards out. With my mind now set on landing this fish, I eased off a little bit and started to enjoy the fight. After a little battle under the rod tip, we slipped the net under a fish known as ‘the twin’. She weighed in at a very healthy weight of 29lb 14oz. Luckily, both Harvey Watson and Oscar T were here to take some very much appreciated photos. Thanks boys!